The Future We Want: Sustainability Reporting at Rio+20

July 29, 2012

June marked the occasion of the Rio+20 Earth Summit, the 20th anniversary of the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), in Rio de Janeiro, and the 10th anniversary of the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg.

The final declaration adopted in Rio, entitled “The Future We Want” includes a statement in support of corporate sustainability reporting. Domini was part of a coalition of international investors managing $2 trillion seeking a strong commitment in Rio from the UN delegates on a corporate sustainability reporting convention. Although the resulting declaration is not as strong as we originally wanted, it represents a significant achievement of the investor coalition, which faced opposition from a number of countries and, in particular, the US Chamber of Commerce.

Domini had the privilege of representing the investor coalition at two preparatory meetings in New York, where the delegates were working on the formal declaration to be adopted in Rio, including a working session for delegates from developing countries, including Mexico, China, South Africa and India. We spoke about the significant benefits corporate sustain - ability reporting could provide to developing countries, by helping to improve the social and environmental performance of multinational corporations

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